Xiaomi Mi 4 Announced: Improved Specs and Metallic Design for $320

It’s been lot of Xiaomi news on Technology Personalized these days, and here comes the latest one. The Chinese company has released its 2014 flagship Android smartphone, the Xiaomi Mi 4 which is just a small bump to their 2013 flagship, the Mi 3. The new phone comes with a slightly improved Snapdragon 801 quad-core processor from Qualcomm clocked at 2.5GHz, 3GB of LP-DDR3 RAM, 16/64GB eMMC 5.0, 13 Megapixel rear camera, 8 Megapixel front facing Sony stacked CMOS camera, and finally a 3080 mAh Lithium-ion polymer battery.

Xiaomi Mi 4 Specifications

5-inch Full HD 1080 Display

2.5GHz quad-core Snapdragon 801 Processor

Adreno 330 GPU

3GB LP-DDR3 RAM

16/64GB eMMC 5.0 internal storage

13 MP rear camera with f/1.8

8 MP front camera with Sony CMOS sensor

3,080 mAh Li-Ion battery

Wifi 802.11 b/g/n/ac, Bluetooth 4.0 LE

TD-LTE support

IR Blaster

Just for the reference, the current Xiaomi Mi 3, which just went on sale in India, comes with a 2.3GHz Snapdragon 800 CPU, 2GB DDR3 RAM, 16/64GB internal storage, 13 Megapixel rear camera, 2 Megapixel front facing camera and a 3050 mAh battery. So effectively, the Mi 4 comes with a slightly improved processor, a gigabyte of extra RAM, a slightly faster flash storage technology, much better front facing camera and a negligible bump to the battery size. Both of them carry a 5-inch 1080p Display.

Xiaomi has simply followed the suit of its international brethren like Samsung, LG, HTC and Sony, who all went for a slightly bumped up specs for their 2014 flagships. Xiaomi though, seems to be getting a raw deal mostly because of the unnatural expectations from several rumors and leaks which pegged a 5.5-inch Quad-HD display with the latest Snapdragon 805 processor from Qualcomm. And it was not to be.

As for as the design is concerned, Xiaomi has used metals for the first time, albeit sparingly. There is a metal frame around the device, which along with the curved edges, provides an uncanny resemblance to the Apple iPhone 5S from the front, while from the back, it slightly resembles the Samsung Galaxy Note 3.

As always, Xiaomi is introducing a range of accessories including cover cases for the Mi 4. This includes cases in multiple colors and also in wooden-finish like the Moto X. Additionally, the company has introduced a fitness band, called the Mi Band for a staggeringly low price of just $12!

The Mi 4 is expected to launch with Android 4.4 KitKat and the latest MIUI v6.0 skin on top of it.

Update: The Xiaomi Mi 4 has been priced at RMB 1,999 (US$ 322) for the 16GB version, RMB 2,499 (US$ 400) for the 64GB model in China. This is same as the Mi3 price when it launched before it later got a price cut. It will eventually roll out the the markets outside of China, but no details were announced.

Raju PP Founder-Editor Raju is the founder-editor of Technology Personalized. A proud geek and an Internet freak, who is also a social networking enthusiast. You can follow him on Facebook and on Twitter. Mail Raju PP. Follow rajupp